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William Crookes says:
THE MYSTIC FIRE. 36
"they are unfortunate terms," and experimental
Science will have "nothing to do with any kind of essences except
those which it can see, smell, or taste. It leaves others to the metaphysicians.
. ." We must feel grateful even for so much
This "Primordial Substance" is called by some Chaos. Plato and
the Pythagoreans named it the Soul of the World, after it had been
impregnated by the Spirit of that which broods over the Primeval
Waters, or Chaos. It is by being reflected in it, say the Kabalists, that
the brooding Principle "created" the phantasmagoria of a visible,
manifested Universe. Chaos before, Ether after this "reflection," it is
still the Deity that pervades Space and all things. It is the invisible,
imponderable Spirit of things, and the invisible, but only too tangible,
fluid that radiates from the fingers of the healthy magnetizer, for it is
Vital Electricity—Life itself. Called in derision, by the Marquis de
Mirville, the "Nebulous Almighty," it is to this day termed by the
Theurgists and Occultists the "Living Fire" ; and there is not a Hindu
who practises at dawn a certain kind of meditation but knows its efiects.
It is the "Spirit of Eight" and Magnes. As truly expressed by an
opponent. Magus and Magnes are two branches growing from the same
trunk and shooting forth the same resultants. And in this appellation
of "Living Fire" we may also discover the meaning of the puzzling
sentence in the Zend Avesta: there is "a Fire that gives knowledge of
the future, science and amiable speech"; that is to sa)% which develops
an extraordinary eloquence in the sibyl, the sensitive, and even some
orators.
Writing upon this subject, in his Unveiled, we said:
The Chaos of the ancients, the Zoroastrian Sacred Fire, or the Atash-Behram of
the Parsis ;
the Hermes-fire, the Elmes-fire of the ancient Germans; the Lightning
of Cybele ; the Burning Torch of Apollo ; the Flame on the altar of Pan ; the Inextinguishable
Fire in the temple on the Acropolis, and in that of Vesta; the Fireflame
of Pluto's helm ; the brilliant Sparks on the caps of the Dioscuri, on the
Gorgon's head, the helm of Pallas, and the staff of Mercury; the Egyptian Ptah-
Ra; the Grecian Zeus Cataibates (the Descending) of Pausanias; the Pentecostal
Fire-tongues; the Burning Bush of Moses; the Pillar of Fire of Exodus, and the
Burning Lamp of Abram ; the Eternal Fire of the "bottomless pit"; the Delphic
oracular vapours; the Sidereal Light of the Rosicrucians; the Akasha of the Hindu
Adepts; the Astral Light of Eliphas Levi; the Nerve-Aura and the Fluid of the
Magnetists; the Od of Reichenbach; the Psychod and Ectenic Force of Thury; the
"Psj'chic Force" of Sergeant Cox, and the atmospheric magnetism of some Naturalists;
galvanism ; and finally, electricity—all these are but various names for many
different manifestations or eflFects of the same mysterious, all-pers-ading Cause, the
Greek Archaeus.